All of this discussion now is why I started this post:
1. What Vasious mentioned
- Is it really worth it to have a delay? If enough people 'really' do not like this then that'd be something to think about. If it's just the wings on the back that's an easy fix.
2. The whole larger docks thing:
Yes, this is a major reason I started the thread. It's not just about the ship. It's about the fact that practically everyone thought we wouldn't get these things until we got the specialized platforms that go with them. This is where I start to mean people hung a lot of hopes and dreams on this thing. It emphasized a grander, more complex future for Elite. What this represents now is a contraction. It's also an unnecessary one if we are (and we are) getting new stations.
- all of this suggests rushed irrational thinking or a very strange change in direction
- either way, this design change changes the way we understand the game's scope to be heading... specifically related to our experience of gameplay. Instead of it getting towards my dynamic situations it is a shrink. This requires communication with the community as to why otherwise the expectations so far for what the Beluga represented in terms of advancing content related to ships has now folded. That's bad PR. Another reason I wrote this post.
Point is, all of this section needed discussion and now it is getting it. Otherwise it would just look like FD dropped the ball, cut a corner, or is shrinking. Instead I think we're seeing the rush to the Beluga instead of the Dolphin. And it does seem rushed.
3. CMDR Dreamstate
Concept 'art' yes... but one that had everything to do with large docks, not docking inside stations, bigger ships... more gameplay.
There's a lot of reason to figure out why this happened and ask the serious questions about what that means for the future of the game. It's not an issue as small as not liking the ships. That's why I asked they delay all of this. It makes no sense.
4. GJ51
And it makes no sense.
- Godsailsaqueen
~ Exactly!
Those of us with larger ships have really no use for this thing right now. If it was larger and there was some new gameplay to come of it then wonderful. Right now the Beluga just got shrunk and for no reason while adding nothing really. I mean, I enjoy the story reasons, but it doesn't add anything to our gaming experience. Again, all the reason in the world to delay this thing imo.
5. Kofeyh
I don't know what to think about instantaneous ship summoning. Especially when not from a dock to a dock.
6. Red Anders
Ditto. I thought it was a real step up from what looked like short range luxury yachts. Plus, everyone over at Jacques was getting excited the Beluga would represent
Anyways, I think the Beluga is just a bit of a shocker. I love that trimming up the wings makes it more or less fine, but the wider issues of what it represented I didn't really take it. I knew people were thinking of it as something to ferry people between Jacques and the Bubble. I knew that meant new space stations, but I didn't really put the pieces together.
1. The largest of the rear wings
2. The wider context of gameplay the Beluga stood in for raising questions about the future of the Panther whatever and big ships in the future.
3. A stutter in the game design process cutting out the stepping stone process of older ship designs: new player ships (cheap: dolphin) ... midrange ships (orca: expensive) ...giant things... Cutter/Corvette?
- I personally cannot imagine a reason to play in a Beluga. Even with passenger missions it isn't really doing more than those missions were you go to a system, fly around while you wait for an npc to show up, then drop off cargo. The only difference is this time the npc is on your ship telling you where to go and when to leave. It's like the data update missions too in this way. There's never enough time to reach any of the ones I got and they only update for 25,000 cr.
4. This doesn't look like it has any better Engines than the Orca. That makes its jump range around 18 to 31 max. I can pretty much hop on discord right now and watch the Jacques explorers read that and go, "We've been shafted again!" People were looking for ONE large alternative exploration vessel... and it didn't happen... Not from what this reads.
- This, in and of itself, would be enough for me to shelve the whole thing if I'd been FD. It would have been a nose-located cockpit with the potential for a very well swept back windshield (and more than enough room to be able to put floor windows in)... That didn't happen. So ya, in this sense Explorers are going to be right when they rage they've been shafted again. Another large ship and nothing for exploration.
- As for the cockpit. I actually like it for what the ship's to be doing. However, it will probably remain superseded by not being functional in larger deep space rolls that people had imagined for at least one of these new ships.
5. FD shot themselves in the foot by saying this is the last of two ships we're ever getting. I don't think they realize how much that spells out to people, "The simulator will continue to see updates on a 10 year schedule, but direct-ship-to-player content ceases as of this year."
P.S.
For anyone I'm not directly replying to or seem to be in direct disagreement with (this includes anyone feeling ignored): "I see your arguments as valid."
- I'm not disagreeing with you so as not to polarize the thread towards just my own opinions
- the wider context of the discussion is what wins out for me... not whom I agree with the most (including myself obviously)
1. What Vasious mentioned
- Is it really worth it to have a delay? If enough people 'really' do not like this then that'd be something to think about. If it's just the wings on the back that's an easy fix.
2. The whole larger docks thing:
Yes, this is a major reason I started the thread. It's not just about the ship. It's about the fact that practically everyone thought we wouldn't get these things until we got the specialized platforms that go with them. This is where I start to mean people hung a lot of hopes and dreams on this thing. It emphasized a grander, more complex future for Elite. What this represents now is a contraction. It's also an unnecessary one if we are (and we are) getting new stations.
- all of this suggests rushed irrational thinking or a very strange change in direction
- either way, this design change changes the way we understand the game's scope to be heading... specifically related to our experience of gameplay. Instead of it getting towards my dynamic situations it is a shrink. This requires communication with the community as to why otherwise the expectations so far for what the Beluga represented in terms of advancing content related to ships has now folded. That's bad PR. Another reason I wrote this post.
Point is, all of this section needed discussion and now it is getting it. Otherwise it would just look like FD dropped the ball, cut a corner, or is shrinking. Instead I think we're seeing the rush to the Beluga instead of the Dolphin. And it does seem rushed.
3. CMDR Dreamstate
Concept 'art' yes... but one that had everything to do with large docks, not docking inside stations, bigger ships... more gameplay.
There's a lot of reason to figure out why this happened and ask the serious questions about what that means for the future of the game. It's not an issue as small as not liking the ships. That's why I asked they delay all of this. It makes no sense.
4. GJ51
And it makes no sense.
- Godsailsaqueen
~ Exactly!
Those of us with larger ships have really no use for this thing right now. If it was larger and there was some new gameplay to come of it then wonderful. Right now the Beluga just got shrunk and for no reason while adding nothing really. I mean, I enjoy the story reasons, but it doesn't add anything to our gaming experience. Again, all the reason in the world to delay this thing imo.
5. Kofeyh
I don't know what to think about instantaneous ship summoning. Especially when not from a dock to a dock.
6. Red Anders
Ditto. I thought it was a real step up from what looked like short range luxury yachts. Plus, everyone over at Jacques was getting excited the Beluga would represent
Anyways, I think the Beluga is just a bit of a shocker. I love that trimming up the wings makes it more or less fine, but the wider issues of what it represented I didn't really take it. I knew people were thinking of it as something to ferry people between Jacques and the Bubble. I knew that meant new space stations, but I didn't really put the pieces together.
1. The largest of the rear wings
2. The wider context of gameplay the Beluga stood in for raising questions about the future of the Panther whatever and big ships in the future.
3. A stutter in the game design process cutting out the stepping stone process of older ship designs: new player ships (cheap: dolphin) ... midrange ships (orca: expensive) ...giant things... Cutter/Corvette?
- I personally cannot imagine a reason to play in a Beluga. Even with passenger missions it isn't really doing more than those missions were you go to a system, fly around while you wait for an npc to show up, then drop off cargo. The only difference is this time the npc is on your ship telling you where to go and when to leave. It's like the data update missions too in this way. There's never enough time to reach any of the ones I got and they only update for 25,000 cr.
4. This doesn't look like it has any better Engines than the Orca. That makes its jump range around 18 to 31 max. I can pretty much hop on discord right now and watch the Jacques explorers read that and go, "We've been shafted again!" People were looking for ONE large alternative exploration vessel... and it didn't happen... Not from what this reads.
- This, in and of itself, would be enough for me to shelve the whole thing if I'd been FD. It would have been a nose-located cockpit with the potential for a very well swept back windshield (and more than enough room to be able to put floor windows in)... That didn't happen. So ya, in this sense Explorers are going to be right when they rage they've been shafted again. Another large ship and nothing for exploration.
- As for the cockpit. I actually like it for what the ship's to be doing. However, it will probably remain superseded by not being functional in larger deep space rolls that people had imagined for at least one of these new ships.
5. FD shot themselves in the foot by saying this is the last of two ships we're ever getting. I don't think they realize how much that spells out to people, "The simulator will continue to see updates on a 10 year schedule, but direct-ship-to-player content ceases as of this year."
P.S.
For anyone I'm not directly replying to or seem to be in direct disagreement with (this includes anyone feeling ignored): "I see your arguments as valid."
- I'm not disagreeing with you so as not to polarize the thread towards just my own opinions
- the wider context of the discussion is what wins out for me... not whom I agree with the most (including myself obviously)
Last edited: